Morning After
by SynethesiaTastesGrey
Summary: After a night with Pritkin, Cassie has only one complaint.


Yow. Okay, this hurt. I was trying to get up quietly so as not to wake up Sleeping Beauty beside me - I wanted to surprise him with some coffee - but my legs had other ideas. They felt like I'd sprinted a marathon last night and were resolutely opposed to the idea of bearing any weight whatsoever. In retrospect, maybe going for round four last night hadn't be such a great idea. I took a deep breath and forced myself upright, wobbling a little.

Behind me, Pritkin let out a sleepy moan and shifted into the space I'd just vacated, leaving the blankets slip. I paused to admire the ripple of muscles beneath golden skin and a shiver that had nothing to do with the air conditioning ran down my back. Heat trickled down to the pit of my stomach and suddenly, all the aches and pains seemed worth it.

I turned to find my clothes before I could convince myself to stay and wake him up for round number five. I was so not able for that right now. I discovered my shorts on the floor but as I walked over to them, I felt an uncomfortable, rasping pain on my inner thighs. I stopped to investigate and groaned in frustration.

"You have GOT to be kidding me!" I exclaimed without thinking and Pritkin sat bolt upright. He didn't do anything so clichéd as gasp, just snapped from asleep to awake, gun in hand before his eyes had even focused. Where the hell had he even stashed that?

"What is it?" he demanded, scanning the room like he expected some enemy deity to pop out of his sock drawer. I glared at him accusingly.

"You gave me beard rash on my thighs!"

"Oh." He relaxed visibly and put the gun on safety. "That's kind of - uh - not funny at all," he said, quickly changing course when I glowered at him. His lips quirked at the corner, betraying him, and I snorted indignantly as I stormed off to the bathroom.

Warm arms slipped around my middle as I made it to the door and I felt his lips press against the nape of my neck. I leaned into it for a moment before the scratch of his beard reminded me I was mad at him. I wriggled out of his embrace and he let me but kept hold of my hand.

"Take a shower," he suggested. "I might have something that could help with that."

I tossed my head somewhat melodramatically - I was playing really rather than being seriously put out - and flounced into the bathroom. The hot water soothed away the stiffness of my legs and felt good on my chafed thighs. It improved my mood to the extent that when Pritkin rapped his knuckles on the glass, I smiled at him and beckoned him in with a jerk of my head.

He grinned at me and stripped off the loose, cotton pants he'd been wearing - they were more of a tease than anything else, hanging low on his hips and showing the dusky trail of hair that ran over the hard 'v' of his abdomen. He stepped in under the spray, spun me around and began kneading my shoulder with his calloused, capable hands. I turned to jelly in a matter of seconds, discomfort so completely forgotten that I was almost surprised when he turned me again, knelt in front of me and produced a pot of blueish goop. I eyed it suspiciously.

"Do I want to know what that is?"

"It's a soothing cream. Made from lavendar. Mostly." His green eyes twinkled up at me mischievously and I felt another rush of warmth, but in my chest this time. I had never seen him smile so much as I had in the past three weeks, since I rescued him from hell, dragged his soul back from the past and blurted out that I loved him. Now I got them daily, wicked grins, confident smirks and my favourite, the one I'd never seen before, bright, boyish smiles that lit up his whole face like fireworks going off behind his eyes. I grinned back at him and decided against questioning the 'mostly'. Since the stomach settling tea that had turned out to contain 'distilled essence of leech,' I had realised that I really didn't want to know.

Pritkin apparently took that as permission because he scooped a liberal dollop of goo onto his fingers and began gently rubbing it on my afflicted thighs. I let out a deep, shuddery sigh of relief because that stuff was heaven. Cool and smooth, it made the sting vanish instantly and I tipped my head back into the pleasant heat of water and let him work his magic.

Once the blissful sense of relief had passed, I became aware of how nice his hands felt on my thighs, rough fingers rubbing exquisitely gentle circles on the sensitive skin. I looked down and met his gaze. He blinked up at me innocently and I had to laugh. Bastard. He knew exactly what he was doing. My breathing quickened and my chest began to heave and he definitely wasn't immune to that. His hands tightened a little and he leaned in to press a kiss against the inside of my knee and I parted my legs for him, because Pritkin was a really determined guy and once he decided to go for it, there was no point in doing anything but surrendering to the double orgasms. Then I remembered that it was exactly this kind of thinking that got me in this position in the first place and I clamped my legs shut.

"No," I said sternly and he looked up in surprise. His hair was wet and spiky and his lips were slightly parted. He looked good enough to eat. "Well, not unless you shave," I amended and he grinned his electrifying grin and bounced out of the shower.


End file.
